People often encourage us to go out and “do what you love.” I think it should be rephrased as “love what you do.” Allow me to explain.

When I adopted the identity of “engineer,” I felt tremendous comfort in knowing I was doing something I loved and believed was good for society. And then I realized that this wasn’t so simple. I’m sure many people can relate to the following: you go to bed excited to work on the Thing You Love to Do, you wake up still excited, and when you finally plant ass-in-chair you whip out the phone and scroll for a shameful amount of time. I used to wonder if I was actually “meant” to be an engineer. Surely, it’s supposed to be easier than this! If I love programming so much, why is it so impossible to get myself to sit down and work? It took me a few years to tame my psychology, but now I can do deep work on a fairly consistent basis, and taking the time to build frameworks and muscle-memory around the simple act of doing what I love has been deeply gratifying. I’ll try to explain what’s worked for me.

In 2019 I read Pressfield’s the War of Art where he argues that you can in fact feel immense Resistance towards doing what you love to do, which in his case is writing. Note the capital ‘R’ — to Pressfield, Resistance is a force of nature that stands in the way of human creativity to inhibit change by exploiting our psychology however it must: fear, anxiety, distraction, criticism. Because Resistance is an internal construct, it often knows exactly what arguments to construct to have its way. Pressfield offers two prospective solutions. The first is to embrace Resistance, because he believes we feel the most resistance towards things that we love. The second is to face it head on, one day at time. For Pressfield, this means sitting down at 10:30am every single day and writing until he is exhausted. Page-count is irrelevant, all that matters is that he spent time with the Muse and triumphed over Resistance. Tomorrow, he must do it all over again, but for now, he remains victorious.

This book offered the first framework I used to think about my relationship with my work. However, it was not exhaustive. While it was relieving to think that my resistance was proportional to my love of the craft this only neutralized one avenue towards distraction and despair – embracing Resistance was necessary but not sufficient to conquer it.

Over time, I had built up a significant enough body of evidence to suggest that if I was able to endure the first five or ten minutes of psychological pain and discomfort, I would find myself in a state of bliss and harmony. Occasionally, I’d be so excited to work on a project that the discomfort lasted mere moments, and other times, the discomfort could last as long as an hour, but eventually I’d find a groove. The objective became clear: I needed to outlast the discomfort. I think this is easier said than done. The circuit between hating the idea of working and picking up your phone is so short you don’t even know it’s happening. I found it useful to really sit down and comb through some of the feelings I was experiencing that caused me to retreat into mindlessness.

The first tool for combatting the Resistance was to make the subconscious conscious. Why was I shunning from the uncomfortable and reaching towards the comfortable? There were essentially two scenarios. In the first scenario, I was just bored, and my natural instinct was to stop the boredom by pulling out my phone. I made significant strides combatting boredom during a week-long silent meditation retreat in August 2022. The retreat consisted of alternating, long-periods of sitting and walking meditation, and during the first few days I was extremely irritated. I signed up for the retreat thinking it was a 7-day pill I could swallow that would fill me with gratitude and equanimity and prepare me for a year of grad school at a university I felt I had already outgrown 3 months prior. I didn’t stop to consider that I had to actually live through every single moment of the retreat. I remember constantly checking my watch during meditation sits and referencing the daily schedule posted outside the meditation hall, eagerly waiting for the week to be over so I could return to my typical life. So, on day 3, I asked one of the meditation teachers about how to deal with boredom. He explained that it’s such a powerful mind state because it says “this moment is completely inadequate. Give me anything but this moment.” He encouraged me to take interest in the sensation of boredom, to focus less on doing and more on being, and to practice gentle discipline – getting frustrated at myself for thinking is actually just more thinking. That day, I ditched the watch and walked into the next meditation session excited  to experience boredom so could complete the task he assigned, and it never came. I sat there looking for boredom and instead I found a flurry of other thoughts, random sounds in the room, gradients of light and dark behind my closed eyelids. I realized there was so much innate interest in the moment if I was only willing to look close enough and engage with it in all of its seemingly banal detail. That session completely transformed my experience on the retreat, and from that moment on, whenever I became bored, I knew to look closer. That ability to further engage with the moment unlocked many deep insights (that I might write about some other time). In fact, that retreat was probably one of the greatest step function increases in self-knowledge I’ve had in my life. But the relevant take away for this blogpost is: you won’t be swept out to sea by the tides of discomfort if you find your footing in the sands of the moment. Whenever I feel that a task is too boring, I remember that I once lived a far more boring life for an entire week and was able find immense interest in the subtlest of details. Taking interest is a choice, and it’s a skill that can be developed.

The second scenario in which I avoid work is if I’m afraid. It took me a while to realize that because I identify so much with the nature of my work, I’ve placed such high importance on it. So naturally, if I’m struggling to solve a problem, it feels more like a reflection of my inherent inadequacy than a skill issue – I doubt my ability to ever overcome this skill gap, I’m afraid I’ll be a failure forever, and I’m frustrated that the universe isn’t the way I want it to be. There are many ways to overcome this scenario. I think one of the best pieces of advice is to use what you have. Sometimes, you can combat fear and doubt with anger, resentment, and aggression. You actively tell yourself you hate doing this thing, which gives you energy, but by continuing to do the thing, the energy grows inside. Think Goggins. Other times, you can get energy from telling yourself you love the pain. The love attracts you to the discomfort more, which creates more love, and this energy propels you to finish the task. Personally, I tap into these techniques when I’m tired or pushing on a project close to a deadline. Lately, I’ve noticed that my negative attitude towards the work comes when I’m overwhelmed by the complexity of the task at hand, and by breaking down the day’s goals into smaller subgoals that are easier to conceptualize, it becomes obvious where I should direct my attention and immerse myself in the moment. This requires you to bring the unconscious into the center of your consciousness and dissect it.

Usually after five or ten minutes of mild discomfort, I’m in a state of flow. I completely lose track of time and I’m one with the task at hand. Sometimes, my conscious mind comes back up for air and I lose concentration, but I can usually get back into the flow state as long as I disregard the fleeting thoughts. Ironically, sometimes the thoughts are the voice of negativity and frustration, but its easy to disregard those alleged facts as fiction when I had just spent the previous hour in a state of bliss and harmony.

One last thing I’ll say is when I was in high school, the work was generally pretty easy, so pushing hard against the limits of my current capabilities took some getting used to. I found John Astin’s lesson The Flow of This from Waking Up to be very insightful. He noticed that people often think meditation is a means to an end. “I meditate so I can become one with the moment.” However, John encourages us to view our meditation practice not as a means to an end, but as an expression of that end. Sitting here isn’t a method to get into the present, rather, it is an expression of the present. It’s happening, here and now. Similarly, struggling at programming isn’t a means towards getting mad programming skills. Yes, the skills will come, but you’ll always be solving problems, pushing up against perimeter of ignorance. Struggling on a problem is an expression of being an expert, for experts still struggle on problems. Their problems are just bigger and more complicated – isn’t that exciting!?

I live for these moments. Creating structure and order in my consciousness. Sitting in the presence of god. And I believe they can come from any experience, provided that you seize control over how you frame the moment [1]. Every single moment is infinitely complex and interesting if you look close enough. You don’t have to do what you love to love what you do.

[1] If you’re looking for a more comprehensive guide, I’d suggest reading Flow.